Path Finders

Want to become a weed warrior?

It may sound rough, but meticulous gardeners as well as ax-wielding brutes are needed to help restore parklands by removing invasive plants and cleaning up the rubble from natural disasters.

It’s a good deed, great exercise and a wonderful opportunity to enjoy the outdoors, especially now that the weather is cooler.

There are several volunteer programs like Adopt-A-Trail and Trim ‘N Tread that meet weekly from October through June--months generally without the blazing heat--to work on various trails throughout the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation area.

Already many of these groups are discussing the cleanup plan if El Nino hits the Southland as hard as some forecasters have predicted.

But even if the area doesn’t get blasted by storms this winter, there’s plenty of work to do and two groups are meeting this weekend to get started.

Saturday the Sierra Club will continue working on a new trail it is creating off Topanga Canyon Boulevard. Farther to the northwest, the Santa Monica Mountains Trails Council will meet at Conejo Creek Park in Thousand Oaks to clean up existing park trails.

“We’ve worked on federal, state, county and conservancy property,” said Mary Ann Webster, a Sierra Club volunteer who met her husband, Ron, while working on a trail.

Ron organizes and runs a group called Trail Work for the Sierra Club. Currently the group is designing a trail near Topanga State Park and has helped clean up hundreds of trails after earthquakes, fires and floods severely damaged them.

Twelve years ago, after a huge fire, Jo Kitz created a group called Weed Wars to help restore Sycamore Canyon.

Kitz, who works for the Mountain Restoration Trust, recruits and coordinates volunteers to help maintain trails throughout the 60,000-acre Santa Monica Mountains.

Her group specializes in eradicating invasive species that can damage native vegetation.

“It’s very simple but it’s very tedious because (the invading plants) have so many adaptive techniques,” Kitz said. “And you have to follow up or they come back.”

Among the plants Weed Wars targets are New Zealand spinach and castor oil plant, the latter being a big bush with large, bean-like seeds that Kitz says is among the most invasive of the species found locally.

“It’s great when we look back at acres we’ve worked on and there’s a harmony because it’s picture perfect,” Kitz said.

Next month Weed Wars volunteers will help plant 2,000 oak trees at Malibu Creek State Park in Calabasas.

BE THERE

Trail duty--Volunteer groups meet on weekends to help maintain and clean up trails in the Santa Monica Mountains and other public parks. For information, call the Sierra Club at (310) 359-3126 or the Santa Monica Mountains Trails Council at (818) 222-4531.